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Dating and Mental Illness

Updated: May 24, 2022

Anything about dating always sounds like a trivial topic, or like a segment on Loose Women (not old enough for that yet!), but romantic relationships is one of the strongest forms of human connections we can make. For someone with a mental illness, it can provide refuge or can make them realise that that relationship is not the right one for them, therefore is a very important topic.


Dating involves showing the most vulnerable sides of yourself, even for someone without a mental illness, this may be a terrifying concept but when even you fear your own brain, it is hard to know how another person is going to react to you because sometimes even you find themselves hard to manage or be around. In this post, I will give out some advice for people with and without mental health conditions and how to navigate mental illness within a relationship because for some people, they might have no experience at all on dating someone with a condition. While some might say, you should just love them regardless, it is not all about loving someone unconditionally, there needs to be a level of understanding involved that sometimes sheer love will not be enough.


Partner with a mental health condition(s):

You never know how someone is going to react to you and that is a huge part of the fear of dating someone new who knows nothing about your condition. I am always so scared to trust someone with my feelings and emotions because I feeling I am handing over part of mind to someone else to take care of. Even when you are not dating someone, in the time you are with them, both parties have an influence on how the other feels so when you are in a closer form of relationship and spend longer periods of time with them. Even then when you are not with that person, you still have your feelings changed and altered by someone's words and behaviours towards you.


Don't be afraid to be open

Talk about your illness before you get too serious in your relationship. For a successful relationship, open conversations are crucial. Discuss the things that have led to bad relationship experiences in the past and outline your basic wants and needs from them. It might sound like a really intense conversation to have early in a relationship but there are ways of making it sound more casual, for example, I suffer with depression and anxiety so I like to have structure in my schedule or sometimes I have to really hype myself for plans or take it easy as to not stress me out too much later in the day when those plans are happening. If someone cancels on me and has a poor excuse or reason, I can get very angry and insecure because then with my anxiety, I have all this built up energy and nowhere to go with it or I start overthinking about how that person truly feels about me. So, when I discuss with someone, I might say “making plans and doing them takes a lot of energy and sometimes when people cancel at the last minute for no reason, it makes me feel anxious, insecure and could set off an episode (depending on my current day-to-day mental status)”. Personally, I do not think this sounds demanding, but it is letting my potential partner know that that is a trigger for me.


To some people, something like cancelling plans is so minor and might seem like an overreaction and a lot of the time that is how it is perceived but you cannot expect someone to react the same way to a situation that you might, especially, if you are a partner without any mental health conditions.


I find the actual dating part pretty easy, the flirting and the early days are pretty fun and manageable because there is still a certain distance between them and you. The minute the feelings start to creep in, I get very scared, very quick but we need human interaction in our lives and being intimate with a partner(s) can make us feel like we are being weak but actually, it can make us stronger as sometimes having someone to share can make you feel so much more free and confident. I know that for some us people with mental health conditions, it is scary but do not run away from it. The better educated people are, the more knowledge is spread around, even if the relationship does not work out, they have knowledge that they did not have before and can share with others. Try and see the potential for things to flourish and take it at your own pace, if you feel rushed or pressured, just leave. Save your energy for someone who will take the time to understand.


Partner without a mental health condition(s):

If they come to you and decide to be vulnerable with you, you should consider it a privilege because it means that they trust you and feel like they can be truly themselves with you.


Be supportive

Bad days are natural, when your partner has these days make sure you provide the support that they need. Most of the time, it is just a simple cuddle. The smallest bit of physical contact can really help or sometimes it could be the total opposite. Your partner might need you to just sit there in silence and not touch them, just your presence is enough. All people want when they have these types of days is to feel safe and secure in their surroundings.


Educate yourself on their condition

Never assume you know everything about someone’s condition. Do some research and ask your partner questions to learn about what their main symptoms are or what effect their condition has on their life.

Most of the time, people have signs or tells for when their behaviour is about to change; when low moods are coming in, panic attacks are imminent or when they are in a very vulnerable position. Different people have different tells, for example, when I am about to have a panic attack, I tend to hold my breath.


Be patient and understanding

Being vulnerable with someone about your mental illness is very stressful and takes a lot of courage to do it. If they open to you and you do not feel like you can understand where they are coming from ask questions, take the time to understand why they feel that way or why they behave certain ways.


If something seems a bit extreme to you, for example, cancelling plans, then try to understand that, yes, it easy to rearrange and it’s not a big deal but to them, it could be a trigger point. You need to acknowledge that for them, a situation could be much more difficult for them to process than you. If you cannot find yourself able to put yourself in their shoes, then just see how they react and ask them how it makes them feel so you can get a better sense of understanding.


Take care of your emotional needs

It is hard being someone’s emotional system and sometimes it can be very draining on you so make sure that you take care of your own emotional needs. Do not be afraid to talk to your partner about what you need from them or if you are struggling too in fear of triggering or upsetting them. Relationships are all about equal effort and understanding and just because we are mentally unwell, does not mean that we cannot help if you are feeling low yourself. In fact, they could find ways and open discussions that could help you feel more positive sooner because they have been there themselves at the start of their illness.


Don't try to fix them

Having a mental illness does not mean that they are broken or incomplete, so they do not need to be fixed. Your only responsibility to your partner when it comes to their mental illness is to support them and be there when they need you, not to fix them. People with mental illness conditions already feel broken sometimes and like their world might just start crumbling around them so do not make them feel like you want them to change too by trying to change them.



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